Is Fordola the monster Lyse says she is?

[Galgarion]

Between the two of them, I'm finding myself feeling more Sympathy for Fordola. We know the way she and her Skulls treated her countrymen was crap, but we also know that she was overcompensating out of guilt and a deeply invested inferiority complex. Her entire life has been hell, it's not hard to feel bad for her. So Lyse's little hero of justice announcements like "I should kill you for what you've done!" or "You'll live to see justice!" just kind of come across as posturing. I won't call it a false equivilancy since Fordola's actions are objectively worse, and she is in wiling service to a sociopath, but at the same time, is Lyse's stark view of her as evil really justifiable? Yes, she killed Meffrid and Conrad, but Fordola is an imperial: how does killing them make her a "kin-slaying traitor" instead of a tremendously effective soldier?

[VargasVermillion]

I kinda feel like characters like Lyse are too self righteous and haven't really had that knocked out of them. regardless of what the right thing is it's incredibly naive to assume everyone can just give up the life their conquerors gave them for better or worse.

[Galgarion]

I kinda feel like characters like Lyse are too self righteous and haven't really had that knocked out of them. regardless of what the right thing is it's incredibly naive to assume everyone can just give up the life their conquerors gave them for better or worse.

That's a good articulation of what I was feeling. I feel like her thinking is just to too straight-forward. "Us or them," Conrad died talking down a group of Skulls, but I really feel like L would have just blitzed them.

[Kohdo]

A lot of Lyse's rhetoric towards Fordola probably stems not from a reaction to Fordola's specific actions but moreso that she betrayed her people.

I kinda feel like characters like Lyse are too self righteous and haven't really had that knocked out of them.

Also a fair amount of this.

And a friendly reminder that Ala Mhigo is historically a warmongering state, and has previously tried to do to other city-states what Garlemald has done to them. But muh evil Garleans, or something.

[YianKutku]

A lot of Lyse's rhetoric towards Fordola probably stems not from a reaction to Fordola's specific actions but moreso that she betrayed her people.

Considering the Scions count Cid nan Garlond as an ally, I'm not sure this is entirely the case.

[Kohdo]

Considering the Scions count Cid nan Garlond as an ally, I'm not sure this is entirely the case.

Lyse and Fordola are both Ala Mhigan, so Fordola betraying her people to the Empire probably struck a nerve with Lyse. Cid betrayed Garlemald, which nobody opposed to Garlemald would realistically take offense to.

[YianKutku]

Lyse and Fordola are both Ala Mhigan, so Fordola betraying her people to the Empire probably struck a nerve with Lyse. Cid betrayed Garlemald, which nobody opposed to Garlemald would realistically take offense to.

Which, again, brings up the philosophical questions of what constitutes actual betrayal. Fordola knows nothing about free Ala Mhigo. I don't even think she knows much about the King of Ruin outside of whatever has been taught to her (which will probably be surprisingly congruent between Ala Mhigans and the Empire). Putting her actual actions aside for now, if she works for the Garleans and rises to a high rank in their occupying military, is she betraying the idea of Ala Mhigo? (Recall that her retort to accusations of being a traitor was that the accusers are "no kin of mine".)

Similarly, was Ysayle betraying Ishgard by leading the heretics (especially since until HW, the Church and the State were inseparable)? If Nero suddenly yet inevitably backstabs us, is he betraying us, or simply proving his loyalty to the Empire? Or even both?

Are there degrees of betrayal? Ala Ghiri traded with Imperials because they were the only customers around. Radiata is literally a village of people who worked for the Empire. We can look at a Pilus Prior like Fordola and say that this is Bad, and look at a janitor in Radiata and say that this is Good, but there are all sorts of gradations in between that need to be worked out. I suspect Lyse's point is that rather than draw an arbitrary line in the middle, she'll have to figure out a way to deal with all of it fairly.

In which case, the obvious route I can think of is, again, to focus on Fordola's actions, whether personally or by her orders. Which is not to say the game will go in that direction, but it's the one that I think will bear the least controversial results.

All this, of course, is separate from the other aspect of Fordola's crimes, which is the way she went about her atrocities thinking that they were necessary evils, only to find out that they were not necessary at all.

EDIT: Found another post of mine made when I was going through that part of the MSQ (the destruction of Rhalgr's Reach), with both English text and what I translated the Japanese dialogue as:

Meffrid (English): Traitor! Kinslayer!
Meffrid (Japanese): But you're Ala Mhigan!

Fordola (English): I am no kin of yours.
Fordola (Japanese): I am of the Garlemald Empire.

So it's not clear that Fordola sees herself as betraying Ala Mhigo, as much as being part of the Empire in the first place.

[Hinoto-no-Ryuji]

[A] friendly reminder that Ala Mhigo is historically a warmongering state, and has previously tried to do to other city-states what Garlemald has done to them. But muh evil Garleans, or something.

Ala Mhigo started one war, a century ago, over a need for resources and after overseas trade routes crashed their primary industry. Far from conquer Gridania, they tried to take a piece of the Shroud for their own. The morality of that incursion can be debated, for sure, but I think it's a pretty enormous exaggeration to characterize them as "war-mongering" when precious few NPCs carry that chip on their shoulder (if any); hell, Ishgard is arguably more war-mongering than Ala Mhigo is!

It's also a pretty enormous exaggeration to put the Autumn War as equivalent to Garlemald's ongoing and self-righteous world conquest. It's comparable to Garlemald's initial Ilsabardan conquests, maybe, but the later Othardan and (attempted) Eorzean ones are wholly different both in scale and motive.

[Alien_Gamer]

Yes, it is posturing but thats no different that much of the dialogue between two sides that hate each other. Fordola is Ala Mhigan, she was born there to an Ala Mhigan mother, hence why killing other Ala Mhigans makes her a kin-slayer. That she's also working for Garlemald makes her a traitor to Ala Mhigo. To answer your question, she's both; she's a kin-slaying traitor to other Ala Mhigans and an effective soldier to Garlemald.

Lyse's view of her as evil is absolutely justifiable, as you said Fordola did kill many people in service to Garlemald; in any war, those who kill your friends, family and allies are the evil ones. Its just not a clear cut black and white scenario, there's a lot of grey to Fordola's situation which is what makes her an interesting character as opposed to the Imperial Cohort #35 we see everywhere. Fordola's history makes her actions more understandable and possibly more relatable but I don't think that makes her actions forgivable. I'd guess the next few content patches will have more than a few scenes with characters arguing about what Fordola's fate should be.

[Cilia]

Fordola is a monster, but she is a product of... well, of Zenos' psychopathy. I don't think Lyse is being entirely fair when she blames Fordola entirely for what happened, but she's not entirely wrong either. Though her upbringing and situation can explain her actions, it doesn't excuse them; Fordola still chose to do what she did and should face justice for it.

That doesn't mean killing her, though. That means holding her to account for what she did.

I have little doubt Fordola will continue to play a role in the 4.x series ("So falls the hunter, but what of the hound?") and eagerly await seeing what fate has in store for her.